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Published on December 14, 2016
In 2013, the International Crimes Tribunal sentenced the two Al-Badr leaders to death for killing some of Bangladesh's top intellectuals just two days before the Pakistani forces surrendered.
Both are believed to have fled abroad and thus have lost out on the opportunity to appeal, because they did not surrender in court.
On Wednesday, after paying homage to the intellectual martyrs at the Memorial in Dhaka's Mirpur, Minister Obaidul Quader told reporters: “We hope to bring them back soon and execute their death sentences.”
Bangladesh has so far hanged two war criminals for killing the intellectuals.
Jamaat-e-Islami chief Motiur Rahman Nizami was hanged on May 11 this year while Secretary General Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid was executed on Nov 22 last year.
During the Liberation War, Nizami was the chief of Islami Chhatra Sangha (ICS), the then students’ affiliate of the Jamaat.
He was also the chief of the Al-Badr force that was formed by some members of Chhatra Sangha. Its Secretary General Mujahid took over from him in September 1971.
Ashraf and Mueen, two ICS central leaders, have been found guilty of abducting and killing 18 intellectuals – nine teachers of Dhaka University, six journalists and three physicians.
The intellectuals wanted to build a secular society imbued with the spirit of Liberation War, said Quader.
“The communal elements who opposed our independence and murdered our best brains are still plotting,” he said.
Photo: Saiful Islam Kallol
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